This Too Shall Pass

Sometimes the trick to mental health recovery is not mindfulness or insight, it is just bleak endurance. This is because our brains can put us through hell when they want to: when they are out of balance or starved of an addiction or when they are sounding the alarm about invisible threats. It can be hard to just get through the night.

At such times it might be beyond our strength to be focused or skillful or disciplined. We simply have to ride out the storm.

But a couple of tools are always with us, even in our darkest moments. We always have our values, the sense of meaning that comes from knowing we can do just a little bit more good in the world if we make it through to calmer waters. Somewhere out there is someone who can benefit from us being alive.

We also have our own selves, the continuously unfolding story of a human being who might stumble but who is ultimately deserving of tenderness and affection, even if we can only get it from ourselves right now.

We also have the ability to just let go, which is not the same as giving up. Letting go means lying down somewhere safe, accepting that our body is in no danger and then allowing the sensations of our troubled mind to wash over us.

Pain exits our soul through the conscious mind, it must be experienced and given its opportunity to turn into sadness or grief. It won’t accept anything less than that. It will insist on delivering its message. By having the courage to be passive for these uncomfortable feelings, we can allow that pain to do its job, and we will find ourselves alive and safe on the other side.

Our emotional suffering is not always fair or proportionate. It is not always well timed and convenient. It can certainly feel exhausting and disorienting and unbearable. But it is always survivable, always ultimately fleeting in the long span of our lives. And that is why the wise men throughout history like Socrates and Marcus Aurelius have borne their own pains with the reminder ‘This Too Shall Pass’